


The Sound Of Something Blooming

by starsand90ssoftdrinks (SuperNovaWriting)



Series: Flaws of Numeric Systems [2]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Citizens Vs Government, Eventual Romance, Fluff and Angst, Government, Humor, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Swearing, Teen Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-08
Updated: 2019-07-08
Packaged: 2020-06-24 13:09:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19724308
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SuperNovaWriting/pseuds/starsand90ssoftdrinks
Summary: In this chapter:Lance gets a new roommateSorren explores his daddy issuesAnd two teenage boys resolve sexual tension the only way they know how: Beating the shit out of each other





	The Sound Of Something Blooming

**Author's Note:**

> Wanted chapter 3 to be done before i posted this! Have fun!

Dinner and free time pass easily, slipping by as Lance sits in his room drawing. The sketch is oddly captivating, though he’s not quite sure why this new character makes his heart squirm around in his chest. It doesn’t look particularly interesting, aside from having features oddly similar to someone that he can’t put a finger on. A knock on his door comes at about eight thirty, and he stands to answer it, unfortunately hearing Sorren’s voice through the wood.   
“I hope you don’t mind,” A tall greying-brown haired man says as Lance opens the door with a less than pleased expression, “But you’ll be getting a roommate this year.”   
Sorren stands in the doorway with two large brown suitcases, beaming at Lance and giving him a small wave.   
“But dad!” Lance whines, exasperated. This man is Mr.Wormwood, the school’s dean and Lance’s adoptive father.   
He stares down his son through round tortoiseshell glasses, and the look makes him grumble in defeat. 

Sorren enters their now shared room and makes his way to the unoccupied bed, setting down his things as Lance whisper argues with his father.  
“Why is he here!?” Whisper shouts a very angry Lance, disbelieving everything before his eyes.   
“I’m sorry Lance,” His father begins, “But I had nowhere else to put him. You have to understand that.”  
Barely able to sputter out an answer, it takes Lance a minute of angry mumbling to come up with a response, “You can’t just expect me to accept him with open arms!”  
“I can, and I do,” Mr.Wormwood’s tone is very serious, but not at all mean, “You will be on your best behaviour, and be courteous to him, do you understand?”  
Lance bites his lip, and stares down at the carpet, “Yes.”   
His father seems to enjoy this response and gives him a very loving smile.   
“Thank you, I’ll let you help him settle in,” Mr.Wormwood says, pressing a soft kiss to the top of Lance’s head before leaving and closing the door behind him. 

Flopping back on his bed, Lance swiftly removes the elastic holding his ponytail and his hair falls around his body. It’s much longer than it seems at first, when pulled up it loses some length but when undone it drapes across his whole back and most of his upper thighs. Sorren explores the room as Lance sulks, never snooping but simply idly observing. He takes a look at his storage and desk provided, there is quite a lot of space for books, notes, and other things he may want to keep around. He has a window by his desk with the curtains drawn, which he opens to realize a corner of the window is painted to appear broken.   
“What’s with the paint?” Sorren asks, loud enough for Lance to tell he’s asking him.   
“Someone broke the window two years ago,” Grumbles Lance, muffled by his bed sheets. “It got fixed but I painted the cracks back on so the culprits will still feel guilty.”   
Sorren blinked slowly, softly muttering out, “That’s kinda mean.”   
“They hit a baseball through my window and hit me in the head,” Lance says, sitting up and staring at him. “It hurt. So the guilt is the least of their worries.”   
Sorren can’t help but imagine him as the girl from the ring, with his long draping hair and little glare. 

The rest of the evening is spent in silence, and despite it not being thoroughly uncomfortable silence, Lance still finds it hard to sleep that night. He’s never had to share his room, and especially sharing it with Sorren had him worried. He lay still through the night as Sorren slept soundly in the other bed, not sleeping until his eyes gave out on him. Traitors. The next morning, he sneaks out before Sorren is awake and meets Sylvia and Lauren in their dorm room. Usually, the pair of girls were already up, and Sylvia was helping Lauren manage her bed head. Lance walked in as Lauren had just begun this process, it was always quite a funny sight. Whenever Lauren stayed still for too long, she accumulated a large amount of electrical energy and it made her hair appear as if she had just been electrocuted. It often looked very cartoonish.   
“Ow! Sylvie be fuckin’ careful!” Lauren shouts, tugging her messy hair from Sylvia’s grip.  
“I'm sorry!” Sylvia cries out, “This one knot is just getting to me!”   
Lance walks over to his friends and without a word, plucks the comb and straightener from Sylvia’s grip.   
“Oh! Good morning Lance!” Sylvia pipes up, after jumping slightly at his quiet appearance.   
He begins running the very thin comb through Lauren’s hair, using the straightener on the knots to undo them, then running the comb through again.  
“Like that.” He says casually, and Lauren gives him a thankful smile.   
“I can never do it as well as you can!” Sylvia calls out cheerfully, happy for the help. 

He sits on Lauren’s bed until both girls are done getting ready for the day, and neither seems to mind his presence. He speaks up before they go to leave, and they stop in their tracks.   
“Sorren is my roommate now.” He says, softer than a whisper, but both girls turn on their heels and give him looks of utter disbelief.   
“You’re kidding,” Lauren mutters, confusion very obvious on her face.   
“That…” Sylvia starts, looking for something positive to say, “Isn’t ideal…”   
Lance shrugs, and they all go quiet. Breakfast is again, oddly normal, despite being two days into the new school year with a very odd predicament before him. The four of them speak of very normal things, and for a while, Lance forgets the strange situation he’s in. The bell rings and the four part ways, leaving Lance alone in the halls to be avoided like all other days. A resounding feeling of loneliness racks his mind for a fleeting second before he notices Sorren pressed against his locker. 

Three seniors have him cornered with nasty looks on their faces, but Sorren seems unbothered.   
“I’m just trying to get my books,” Sorren speaks, sickeningly cheerful despite the time.  
The trio of seniors scoff, and the largest glares him down, despite being shorter than him. “You don’t belong here, sunshine.”   
The sunshine is spoken mockingly, and Lance watches as Sorren simply continues to smile.   
“What the hell is he doing!?” Lance thought, “That kid is going to beat the shit out of him if he keeps smiling at him like that!”   
Something Lance assumed was anger bubbled in his chest, and he came to the very quick conclusion that Sorren was his to hate, and his alone. Not in a romantic or platonic way, he was just his to fight. If anyone were going to beat up Sorren, it would be him. Lance leans against the end of the string on lockers and glares at the trio. 

“Get lost, I called dibs on kicking his ass,” Lance growls, a layer of faux anger on his face, despite him never having fought anyone before. Perks of being feared, he guessed.   
The seniors disperse as quickly as they came, and the second they’re gone, Sorren bursts into laughter.   
“What’s that for!? I just saved you from getting your ass kicked!” Lance shouts, giving him a shove that seems much too playful to onlookers.   
“It’s just-” Sorren starts through laughter, “You. Kicking my ass.”   
Lance looks offended, and his mouth is agape, “I could!”  
Sorren snickers, gets his books, and Lance walks with him to their first class. Not because he likes him though, he definitely does not like Sorren at all. 

During their lunch period, Sorren kindly rejects Sylvia’s offer to let him sit with their quartet. Ethan, Lauren, and Lance glared from behind her as she did and though he didn’t find Lance that threatening, he certainly did not want to mess around with whomever he kept company around. Heading to his dormitory, and internally cursing himself when seeing the time. He pulls a laptop from under his bed, and when it opens he nearly groans in anguish. He let the skype call ring once more and then answered, plastering on the sweetest smile in the world. 

A brown haired man sits in an office not too different from one of a teacher, despite him not seeming to have a very teacherly demeanor. He scowls through the screen which has Sorren internally kicking himself.   
“Three rings is entirely ridiculous, Helios. You should have picked up on the first.” A deep booming voice comes from the laptop, Sorren sneakily turns down his sound.   
“Sorry, Father,” He begins, “My classes ran late.”   
The man tsks at him, “I expect you’ve infiltrated the ten.”   
“Yes, Father,” Sorren responds, no emotional tilt in his voice or smile on his face.   
“And you will be completing our plan to dispose of him, correct?”  
“Yes, Father.” He responds, fighting the urge to frown and scrunch up his features.   
“And you understand what will become of you if you fail?” The man speaks but gets no response, Sorren does not like this question one bit. 

“Sorren. What will happen if you fail? Tell me.” He seems very angry, questioning like a mother who discovered six cookies missing from the cookie jar, Sorren can’t help but imagine how angry he would be if he found out Sorren quite liked Lance.   
“...Permanent termination, I know.” He mutters back, more dejected than he meant to.   
“I didn’t father a zero for you to go around failing me.” His father snaps at him, angry at the dejection, but what do you expect when you imply you’d murder your own son? “Pick up on the first ring next time.” He hangs up and Sorren fights the urge to fling his computer out the window.   
“Pick up on the first ring next time! Kill someone you don’t know just because I say so! Be the worlds stupid frickin’ hero just cause I said so!” He mocks, his voice faking the booming depth of his fathers.  
He does end up chucking his laptop onto the ground and falling back onto his bed with the grace of an anguished Disney princess. 

He searches his mind for ways to make himself feel slightly better, though how does one do that after being reminded that your father would commit filicide if you don’t be what society expects of you? This is an unfortunate reality of most lower numbered children, but the pressure on Sorren was insurmountable compared to ones and twos. Everyone knew who he was, some even called him a modern-day Jesus without the crucifixion. Yet. Nobody ever said the ‘yet’ to his face, but he knew it was there. There has never once been a hero with a happy ending, and Sorren is not determined to get a happy ending. He is determined not to be a hero. What makes him any different, huh? A number on a meaningless scale of morality doesn’t signify your worth, and yet here he was. He sat in a dorm room in a school not meant for ‘People like him’ which was frankly a very stupid thing to think. He was no different from the kids here, he was no different from Lance. The kids at the lower numbered schools either hated their title or let it inflate their ego so much that they made Sorren want to throw up in his mouth. 

He decides to head to the music room with his guitar, which he grabs from his closet, before heading to the teacher’s lounge to ask for the key. He knocks and is greeted by said music teacher, an elderly lady whom everyone called “Mrs.Bee” who was probably the sweetest person Sorren had ever met. She openly shared on her first day of classes that she did not think Sorren was any different from anyone else in the class, and that he was to be treated kindly in her room at the very least. He’d first met her in the early summer when he first came to see the school with his mother, and she was kinder to him than any teacher he had ever had.   
“Hello, I’m sorry to interrupt-” He begins with a smile but she cuts him off abruptly.  
“Oh, it’s no problem at all, my dear!” She begins, and Sorren can’t help but beam, “If you’re searching for the key, the quartet came along to ask me for it a while ago, but you’re welcome to share the space with them! Such lovely kids!”   
“Oh, I see,” Sorren mutters, hoping not to bug them, “Well, thank you! Have a good lunch!”   
Sorren waves and is off, apprehensive as he cracks open the door to a singing voice that he notes could definitely use some work. 

He stares at Ethan on the stage, trying his best, as Lauren mans the lights and sound. Lance is chucking pieces of fruit at him and good-naturedly booing while Sylvia is conjuring flowers and tossing them at him, singing endless praises. Lauren is the first to notice him and calls out to him from the booth.   
“Ay, Sorren. Thank god you’re here, sub in for Ethan, I need to figure out the lights and sound stuff for class on Friday.” Her voice does not need to be mic'd up to carry and he simply gives her a thumbs up.   
Lance, Sylvia, and Ethan are seated in front of him, and the two boys look less than pleased. He seats himself in front of the mic and pulls over a guitar mic, which Lauren turns on as he gets out his guitar. They perform a quick soundcheck on the guitar mic.  
“What should I sing?” Sorren asks, looking up to Lauren in the booth.  
“Anything,” She says, “As long as you do it well.” 

You could technically picture Sorren singing whatever you’d like during this particular scene, and yet the quality would remain. The lights are golden and shine down on him making him look much more angelic than one would assume he ever could. He strums with gentle accuracy that proves he’s quite adept, but that isn’t the real treat, the treat is his voice. He’s more than just an adept singer, he sounds marvelous. Lance’s look of grumpiness because of him crashing his fruit throwing party melted off as he finished the first verse, completely enamored with the performance, staring at him with a soft twinkle in his eyes. It is also easy to tell that stress melts off him as he sings, sounding beautiful and effortless, passion for music falls from his lips and drips into the ears of his four-person audience. 

“Y’know” Starts Lauren, once he’s finished, “Mrs.Bee said you were good, I didn’t expect you to be that good.”  
Slyvia nods and smiles in agreement, “Yeah! You were frickin’ awesome!”  
Sorren turns away, shy and embarrassed. Neither of the other boys speaks, Lance still shaking off his momentary musical daze. The room is silent for a while until Ethan finally speaks up.   
“Can you play All Star by Smash Mouth?” He asks, shit-eating grin on his face.  
Slyvia gently smacks him as Sorren jokingly plays the first few chords, the other four teens lose their minds. He wouldn’t want to admit that the environment here, with people who were supposed to be his enemies, was ten times better than his life and ‘friends’ at his last school. If he were particularly ignorant of their dislike of him, they may have felt like budding friends. 

The smiles that the five of them had plastered on would make one assume that maybe they were, Sorren could hope. He desperately wanted someone here to like him. For the next half an hour, he felt as if he were being indoctrinated into their group in some odd way. They quipped at him, checking to see if he falters, but he never did. Wit and sarcasm oozed from all five teenagers, and the room was full of laughter and kind smiles. Neither ‘side’ trusted the other yet, but it was fun. Sylvia offers him a spot in their group during their next class, Mandatory Athleticism Training or MAT, and this time Lauren and Ethan don’t seem to mind all that much. Lance, however, is still very much stuck in his ways of pretending they did not get along. This was fine by Sorren, he knew he could get him to trust him sooner or later. From a purely strategical standpoint, Lance was glad Sorren was getting along with his friends. It might be a good idea to have them be at least a little fond of him if he was going to destroy the government it could be a good idea to have more than one accomplice. 

Arrival at MAT class was always a treat. The gymnasium looked as if it was built for Olympians, and it was the one space in the school where the use of powers wasn’t strictly prohibited. Each kid changed from their uniforms into their chosen gym clothes. Some people, like Lauren, went for traditional athletic wear and bore as much skin as they could so that they wouldn’t have to worry about fabric catching. Some people, who were a little lazier with training like Ethan and Lance, would wear loose sweatpants and t-shirts with funny slogans on them. Ethan’s particular favorite was a shirt that was a rip-off Nike shirt that said “Knife” instead of Nike. It was a Christmas gift from Lauren two years prior and it made him laugh every time he saw it. Another brand of wear, which Sylvia and Sorren were both partial to, was off-handedly called by Lauren “Bisexual Kryptonite”. Both looked a little more gritty than usual, Sorren wearing fingerless gloves like they were made to work out in, Sylvia with her regular fist wrapped in athletic tape. They looked practically the same, both in shorts that expose most of their thighs with rolled up pinned cuffs, flannels tied around their waists, and loose t-shirts with rolled up sleeves.   
“God,” Lauren mutters, stood with Ethan as Sylvia and Sorren both walk towards them, “Do you think they know they’re hot?”   
“I can’t speak for Sorren, but Sylvia is gorgeous. Why did we decide to have hot friends?” Ethan shoots back quickly, arms folded over his chest with a wide smirk on his face.  
“I dunno man!” Lauren laughs, and watches as Sorren and Sylvia notice and start model posing.   
Lauren and Ethan cheer and whoop, not noticing Lance coming up behind them until they’ve been smacked across the head.

“We should be working not gassing up our friends,” Lance shouts, an angry tilt in his voice, but he can’t be too mad.   
“I look great, admit it!” Sorren calls, as he and Sylvia rush over, both slightly flushed from the cheering and whooping.   
Lance definitely would not admit that Sorren looked great, so he resolved to glare at him.   
“You, Me, Spar, Now.” Lance spat out, pointing at Sorren as he spoke, then walking off and motioning for him to follow. Sorren obliges, following closely behind Lance but never beside him.  
Climbing into the empty boxing ring in the center-left of the gymnasium, they stand at opposite corners, and Sylvia ends up popping in, muttering something about being a referee.   
“Okay,” Sylvia begins with a small smile and a worried glance over to Lance, “I’ve got one rule and one rule only. Absolutely no powers. You two are supposed to kill each other but I don’t want it to be now.”  
Sorren smirks at Lance with a glint of confidence in his eye, “You ready, short stuff?”   
“Born ready,” Lance responds, fighting off a similar smirk.   
The whistle sounding the start of a match is blown.

**Author's Note:**

> Ah a, place bets on who is gonna win the fight


End file.
